Left Mexico yesterday and entered Belize (yah mon!) after eight hours on a couple of busses and 45minutes on a very high powered passenger boat arrived at Caye Caulker, an island where we will be based for the next couple of days. When the boat docked at the island a local dude waiting on the dock to sell accomidation/food/taxi rides yelled out to the 50 or so people on the boat, "Welcolme to paradise..........My name is Jesus". It set the tone of the place well.

The island's main claim to fame is as a dive spot it is located on the fringe of the second largest barrier reef in the world and is close to the 'blue hole' which is a dive Mecca made fmous by Jaques Costeau. The people I've met so far are very, very layed back, they speak english for the most part , which is the official language of Belize, though often burt into the local dialect of Creole. They also come in many different shapes and sizes but the majority seem to be of african decent.

We ate dinner last night seated at a rickerty table on the beach at Fran's Grill. Fran is a large Belizian lady of predominately African decent who presence and friendliness is only matched by her amazing cooking. I had opted for the BBQed red snapper (leaving the lobster tails for tomorrow night!). I'm glad I did because I can happily say it was the best fish I ever had and it definitely wasn't the most expensive! For 25 Belizian dollars (about $15AUD) I got a fillited snapper, coconut rice, maashed potato, two glasses of manago and rum punch a sliceof cheese cake (for desert) and a big helping of Mama Fran's hopitality! While we were eating we watched the local police 'road block' where they were stopping motorists and checking their licences (or not, if they knew the driver). The amusing thing is that the island only has around 10 sand roads and the bulk of the population only rides bikes or drives golf carts as no cars are allowed on the island. The police here have a tough life.......

Went snorkeling this afternoon about a mile off shore - it was amazing especially the large singrays that seemed to be everywhere. Funnily enough after Steve Erwin no one wanted to get close to them.

Before I forget I've go to recound an inident at the Mexican side of the border yesterday. A European tourist who was leaving Mexico but coming back in a week was asked to pay the fee of $10 USD (100 pesos) as is normal for someone leaving and soon returning. She replied that she only had 20 euros. So the Mexican offical said that the cost was 20 euros. She replied that euros were worth more than US dollars, but the official would budge, the price of admission and the return waiver was now twenty euros. After a number of futile pleas she accepted the advice of the person next in line and handed over the 20 euros.............the moral to the story is that it always pays to keep some small denomination US dollars handy especially in non-first world countries! Viva Mexico!